Refining circumstances of mortality categories (COMCAT): a verbal autopsy model connecting circumstances of deaths with outcomes for public health decision-making.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Recognising that the causes of over half the world's deaths pass unrecorded, the World Health Organization (WHO) leads development of Verbal Autopsy (VA): a method to understand causes of death in otherwise unregistered populations. Recently, VA has been developed for use outside research environments, supporting countries and communities to recognise and act on their own health priorities. We developed the Circumstances of Mortality Categories (COMCATs) system within VA to provide complementary circumstantial categorisations of deaths.

Objectives

Refine the COMCAT system to (a) support large-scale population assessment and (b) inform public health decision-making.

Methods

We analysed VA data for 7,980 deaths from two South African Health and Socio-Demograp

SUBMITTER: D'Ambruoso L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8986216 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature